rapidio resurection

once upon a time (or about 10 years ago) in a land far far away (or somewhere in the dirty south) there was a monkey who went back to school as an adult to study historical preservation and architecture, and ended up as a graphic designer/book arts nerd.

my first year at art school, my foundation year, was chock full of new things to learn and do and think about. one of my most favorite things of all the things i learned during my time in art school was architectural drafting. for this class i had to purchase a full set of rapidographs. rapidographs are sort of fussy pens, you have to keep them clean and not leave them sitting around with ink in them for too long.... especially not for 8 years, which is approximately how long it had been since i had touched them (and there may or may not have been ink in one or all of them during that long hiatus).

 

i have been doing a lot of drawing lately, and i wondered whether one of my rapidographs might be the right tool for the job (or at least one of the many "right" tools). so i went about seeing if they could be resurrected. i soaked the nibs in water overnight and flushed, rinsed, soaked repeated, until i could feel the mechanism inside moving freely again. of the set of 7 pens i was only able to get the .30 and the .60 working again, but two is better than none!

drawers & labels

on that life list i started back in the fall of 2010 there was a very important goal that i have been working toward for YEARS now. there was a time in the distant past when i truly knew where all my stuff was. i did! maybe part of that was the fact hat i didn't really have all that much stuff, but over the last 10 years i have accumulated a thing or two and my life has been jumbled and sorted and re jumbled more times than i care to count.

but we have roots now. we are settled, and we have been for almost 4 years, it's kind of amazing! in the last 4 months i have finally had the opportunity to go through everything and organize it in such a way that when i need to locate something i actually know where to look. this is revolutionary people!

 

  

one of the most satisfying pieces of this entire process has been using and LABELING(!!!) both the old card catalog that jak rescued from a dumpster, and my little akro-mils drawers. i can't tell you how many times i opened and closed every single drawer in that thing looking for something i knew was in ONE of them, but who the hell knows which one??! now they are ALL labelled. there is a peace and calm that has settled over me that is hard to describe.

 

seriously? who knew i needed a whole drawer just for ball chain?

scrap blankets

like any crotchet fiend or knitter knows you end up with lots of odds and ends of yarn from different projects. scraps that aren't enough to make anything of any substance with. everyone has their own strategies for dealing with this. maybe you stash it away, hording every bit like a pack rat or maybe you make tiny stuffies that only need a little bit of yarn. my strategy is scrap blankets (afghans i guess?)!

i made my first scrap blanket about a year ago, and my favorite thing about it is that when i look it i remember all the different projects the different bits came from. some are yarns i bought and never made anything with, they were learning experiences that taught me what kinds of yarn work best for different projects, some bits are left over from baby blankets and scarves, and then there are spools of random things my husband brought home from some junk pile he was picking.

the first blanket was an experiment, and it turned out awesome! the second one was identical to the first only with different yarn. they were both a super simple stripe pattern. now i am experimenting with different patterns. i made a giant (ok, maybe not "giant", maybe only "big") granny square, which turned out pretty cool (at least domino thinks so).

currently i am in the process of making an "ocean tranquility" afghan pattern that i found on the intewebs (yes, the name had some influence on my pattern selection). many of the yarns i am using came form an etsyrain craft swap, so many of the colors and the types of yarn are not my normal selections, which has been a fun experiment.

 

i have also been making rugs from scrap fabric, making the fabric yarn is labor intensive, sneeze inducing, and a little bit insane, but i love the results. however i do not know HOW some people make their rugs so perfect and even and YUM. i like the scrappiness of my rugs, but OMG those rugs are phenomenal. LOVE & WANT!

ANYWAY... i just started a second ocean tranquility afghan made of cozy for my niece who is turning 10 in a couple weeks. i noticed that she and her brother both end up on the couch with a book under one of my blankets whenever they come over, so i thought she might like one of her own!

paste paper

the last time i made paste paper i was in school. it was the first day of my first bookbinding class and we made paste paper so that for our second class we could use the decorative paper as the covers for the three pamphlet stitch binding that we would be learning.

paste paper is much like finger painting for adults. all ages really, but we happened to be a room of adults (mostly). the end results are a little rustic for my taste, but i did think that it was really fun to make my own decorative paper, so i want to recreate this experience for my students at the UW this summer.

so to that end i figured that i would do a test run to refresh my memory on the process:

i think my paste ended up being a little too thick, and what i was afraid was too much paint in the orange turned out to be just right. all in all a big success, i now know what to trouble shoot for. go paste paper!

i do think a trip to the thrift store will be in order so that i can stock up on tools to make cool patterns with. the simple circles that i made with a toilet paper roll were good enough for me but there is all kinds of patterns you can create.

little paper houses

full disclosure: the first time i attempted this project there was some throwing involved. i seriously could not grok the step where you carefully construct the base of the house, and the direction that the flaps flap in is of utmost importance.

after reading the posts on this blog you might think that i spend much of my time throwing things across the room, but it's simply not true. yes, i do get frustrated occasionally, but it's only under extreme distress that things turn violent.

months passed before i brought myself to attempting this project again. upon my second attempt, (preceded by a few deep breaths and a little patience), i finally got it. its really quite simple, no really! i encourage you to try it, and if you are not paper-geek inclined i am happy to make them for you (for a wee fee of course).

there is something cozy about these little paper houses. line them up along a windowsill, on your mantle, or anywhere you need a little cozy in your life!

zig to the zag yo!

i first learned this zig zag structure from the awesome carol barton when i was at uarts. she showed us how to make made a wee 3" square version, and i wondered for years after that what one would be like BIG. or at least as big as i could fathom cutting out by hand. since the cover is made from a single sheet of paper, that would determine that maximum possible size for the final book.

i finally tested it out one day when i had a few surplus sheets of big paper from another project. i did the math and figured that from the 25" x 19" sheet of heavy card stock paper i had i would be able to make a book that was 5.75" square. i was so excited to try it out!

the end result was so satisfying, and made such a unique and simple book that i was hooked! i wanted to make MORE and i wanted to SHARE them! thus the mischievo zig zag book was born.

the current stock on hand is gum drop green and zesty orange, and when i sell out of those i will pick another delicious color combination.

the interior text pages are a random assortment of re purposed ledger paper from estate sales, some coated stock that is scrap from an edition of books i printed years ago, some luscious linen second sheet letter head stock from one of my husband's old enterprises, and other recycled or re purposed paper.

these books are excellent as travel journals, they make great gifts for any writer, doodler, list maker or sketchbook keeper!

tapetex

i just launched some crocheted baskets over on my etsy site, and it got me thinking about the material i used to make them.

a few years ago i found about 15 rolls of this cool material called tapetex in a variety of colors at an architectural salvage store. i have never seen anything like it before, but its intended purpose is to mark off areas in a construction site. there is nothing on the packaging to indicate what it is made of, but it feels like some kind of soft slightly squishy rayon material. since i am always looking for interesting materials to crochet i bought everything they had!

when i first started to crochet as an adult i was a little shocked at how expensive yarn can be and how much of it you need to make anything substantial. i immediately started looking for economical alternatives. as a result of my quest i have discovered all kinds of interesting materials ranging from cheap to free.

tapetex crochets beautifully into thick, soft, flexible baskets with a textured surface that feathers at the edges. i have not been able to find any more of this stuff, and with only 10 rolls left i will be so sad when it is all gone! i have a full roll still wrapped in the original packaging of orange (tiger lily) tape that i am saving for something special!